The entire thing has been a politicized distraction and propaganda campaign ... the level of discourse in America is now at a terrifying and dangerous quality; we used to mock the propaganda of the Soviets, China, etc. but we are descending into their grade.

Exactly. Obama just created a National Anti-Propaganda Center to keep watch over American news organizations.

An elaborate surveillance/police state combined with a propaganda system is scary indeed, no matter which president or political party controls it.

>National Anti-Propaganda Center to keep watch over American news organizations.

I googled this term and all I got were conspiracy theory websites.

Here's the actual law: https://www.congress.gov/bill/114th-congress/senate-bill/327...

State-sponsored actions intended to undermine the basis of our political institutions is a "distraction"? What qualifies as "news" by your standards?

If you believe this proves that claim I have some WMD's in Iraq to sell you.

I said no such thing. Nor does the report.

It's not meant to be read. It's meant to be announced on television as 'proof'.

> No one is denying that the emails are real.

Actually, Donna Brazile, who is inexplicably still the current chair of the DNC, claimed the emails were falsified: https://youtu.be/P_WHsr07cbY?t=458

I wouldn't trust a person like Donna Brazile with running a thing as simple as a banana stand, the fact that she claims the emails were falsified convinces people like myself that they were indeed the real deal.

And if someone wasn't aware emails are DKIM verified for authenticity.

The problem with her is that she lies constantly, she isn't technically aware enough to make those kinds of claims.

The Chinese Fighter plane probably was a bigger deal on the merits. I don't know how seriously our national security apparatus takes that versus this attack.

As an attack, though, it didn't rise to a major domestic political issue because there just isn't anything up for debate. It happened, it's clearly bad — where was our response lacking? Maybe it was lacking, but apparently our two parties don't disagree enough to make it an issue.

And that's the issue here. If both parties agreed that it's wrong for foreign governments to hack the DNC's e-mail and air their dirty laundry, there wouldn't be much public debate. But the President elect claims it didn't even happen, and that's making the stakes far larger than the issue itself.

It's like Elian Gonzales: how much does the event itself matter? Not that much. How much do the conflicting political forces arrayed around the event matter? A whole lot.

>If both parties agreed that it's wrong for foreign governments to hack the DNC's

1. There is no proof that this happened

2. Who said they did not agree?

It was the timing of the exposure that could have interfered with the results of the Presidential election which is a major news event in the US that many people perceive to have a higher impact on their lives vs. a quietly disclosed hack/coincidence (F-35 example).

Plus in some people's minds a private defense contractor being "hacked" is more along the lines of industrial espionage instead of a major political party being "hacked" during an election. Even worse, certain news outlets reporting that the election itself(!) was hacked which is misleading and could make people think that voting machines were actually hacked by a foreign power instead of the PsyOps which allegedly took place.

There was barely any coverage when the Office of Personnel Management was hacked and the personal data of millions of people holding security clearances was taken. The hue and cry about the social engineering hack of the email of a political party campaign manager seems far in excess of the response for that...

Is it really surprising that a Presidential election is a juicier press coverage topic than the Office of Personnel Management? The House released a comprehensive and scathing report on the OPM hack:

https://oversight.house.gov/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/The-O...

Countries gather intelligence about each other all the time, the interesting part of the hacks surrounding the elections is that the information was made public in an attempt to influence the results. If you recall form the 2008 election both the Obama and McCain campaigns were hacked by China, but it was a conventional information gathering operation. It was in the news, but fell off quickly because nothing was released to try and influence the election.

> The Sony hack had more evidence than this...

Where? The FBI handled the investigation and didn't cite its sources.

https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressrel/press-releases/update-on-s...

> "While the need to protect sensitive sources and methods precludes us from sharing all of this information, our conclusion is based, in part, on the following"

There's also an independent investigation called "Operation Blockbuster", detailed results here: https://www.operationblockbuster.com/wp-content/uploads/2016...

That report does not specifically attribute the Sony hacks to a particular nation-state. It does demonstrate the hack was not the result of a disgruntled employee, but rather an APT group the report refers to as "The Lazarus Group."

In the interests of full disclosure, I worked with the people involved in that operation.

> the Chinese Fighter plane that looks almost identical to the F35 come to mind

The good side is that at least it will probably be NATO interoperable!

> Someone explain to me why this is such an issue?

You're maybe on the wrong website if you need someone to explain this to you.

Delete your account.

Please don't do this here, regardless of the provocation. It just makes the thread worse.

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